One of the best exchanges of Wednesday night’s G.O.P. debate was prompted by a question regarding drug use, and, surprisingly, several candidates not named Donald Trump jumped into the fray.

The discussion kicked off when Senator Rand Paul, discussing his drug-reform proposals, accused Jeb Bush of hypocrisy for having smoked marijuana as a teenager. Though Paul didn’t mention Bush by name, the former governor quickly admitted that yes, 40 years ago, he smoked pot in high school. “I’m sure other people did it and didn’t want to admit it in front of 25 million people,” he joked. “My mom’s certainly not happy that I just did.”

Bush then launched into the differences between his drug plan and Paul’s—specifically, that he would treat marijuana as a gateway to harder drugs, rather than decriminalize it or allow medicinal applications. Ultimately, Bush said, it was an issue for states to decide.

Paul objected, saying that such a plan would not only harm patients who would need it, but also would disproportionately target poorer Americans. “In the current circumstances, kids who had privilege like you do don’t go to jail, but the poor kids in our inner cities go to jail,” he said, alluding to Bush’s family legacy. “I don’t think that’s fair, and I think we need to acknowledge it and it is hypocritical to still want to put poor people in jail.”

While Bush defended his history in Florida, where marijuana was on the ballot as recently as 2014, New Jersey governor Chris Christie leapt in with his own take. Christie pointed out that New Jersey mandates treatment—not jail time—for first-time, non-violent offenders. “I think you need to be pro-life for more than just the time in the womb,” he declared. “It gets tougher when they get out of the womb. And when they’re the 16-year-old drug addict in lockup, that life is just as precious as the life in the womb.” At the same time, he added that he wasn’t a fan of marijuana: “Senator Paul thinks the only victim is the person, look at the decrease in productivity, look at the way people get used and move on to other drugs when they use marijuana as a gateway drug. It is not them that are the only victims—the families are the victims too, children are the victims too, and their employers are the victims also.”

Former C.E.O. Carly Fiorina had her own take on drug legalization, noting that one of her stepchildren lost her life to drug addiction. “We are misleading young people when we tell them that marijuana is just like having beer,” she said, calling for criminal-justice reform and more money invested in treatment.

“And the marijuana kids are smoking today is not the same as the marijuana that Jeb Bush smoked 40 years ago,” Fiorina added. “Sorry, Barbara.”